Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/8885
THE FUNDAMENTALS OF MICROSOFT VOLUME LICENSING Microsoft’s offerings fall into three categories: • Systems (solely the Windows desktop OS) • Servers (all server licenses, CALs and management licenses –– everything from Windows Server Standard to a System Center Management license) • Applications (runs on a desktop or laptop, such as Office, Visio Standard, Project Professional, Mappoint) KEY TERMS • Client Access License (CAL): To run a Microsoft product on a server, such as CRM, a CRM Server license is required. However, for clients within the organization to be able to access this server, a CAL is required. CALs will often make up the majority of the acquisition cost of a Microsoft server product. There are two types of CALs: user and device. It is the end customer’s choice which type of CAL to purchase. Organizations that share computers (perhaps three shifts a day on the same computer) will typically require fewer device CALs than user CALs and should opt to license CRM with device CALs in such a scenario. However, if an organization has employees with multiple devices talking to CRM (desktop, laptop, handheld), then user CALs would be optimal. User CALs and device CALs are always priced the same. • Management License (ML): Management licenses can be equated to CALs for servers. Microsoft’s System Center Operations Manager (SCOM) product interfaces with other servers in the environment. Accordingly, a Management License is necessary for each server that interfaces with the SCOM server. Therefore, the product is licensed with a SCOM server license (license to deploy SCOM onto a server) and an ML for every server in the environment that SCOM is monitoring. • Software Assurance (SA): Software Assurance refers to Microsoft’s comprehensive maintenance program intended to maximize the value of its clients’ MS investments at all stages of the lifecycle. While there are many benefits associated with the SA program, the most prevalent is the perpetual access it grants to the latest MS releases. Most MS licenses can be purchased with or without SA. The theory of SA is that by accompanying a license purchase with SA coverage and then subsequently renewing that SA upon its expiration, there will never be a need to re-purchase that underlying license as the firm will be granted perpetual rights to future releases of the product for as long as SA coverage is maintained. The following example illustrates how SA affects upgrade rights: In November 2002, a firm purchases five Office XP Standard Edition licenses with two years of SA (SA expires on November 30, 2004). With the release of Office 2003 Standard the following year, the firm has forever gained the right to run Office 2003 Standard on five of its users’ systems. In 2004, the SA expires (though the licenses remain perpetual), and, on December 1, the firm renews its SA coverage on these licenses with a purchase of three additional years of SA. In early 2007, Microsoft releases Office 2007 Standard Edition. Since the firm’s SA coverage is still active on the date of the 2007 release, the firm now has www.iltanet.org Best Practices in Licensing Agreements 21